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I particularly like the line, “You’ll soon get sick of micro-waving low fat meals for one.” Ahhhh, the perks of being in a relationship, especially one that involve girlfriends who can and do cook. Reminding me that I should really be getting dinner ready!
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I particularly like the line, “You’ll soon get sick of micro-waving low fat meals for one.” Ahhhh, the perks of being in a relationship, especially one that involve girlfriends who can and do cook. Reminding me that I should really be getting dinner ready!
Arab Strap -The Last Romance
The Last Romance is album number 6 for this Scottish duo of Aidan Moffatt and the instrumentally dexterous Malcolm Middleton. For this release they chose to further explore the familiar territory of the trials & errors of relationship of all kinds.
The album opens with Stink, a song about one-night stands and “waking up in the Monday morning stink,” of the weekend’s drunken sex-fest. The second track (There is) No Hope for Us is exactly as it sounds, the honest truth relationships destined to fail. This song has a great groove and becomes a duet at the end as it guest stars female vocalist Nicola MacLeod.
Don’t Ask Me to Dance has an 80’s-pop-rock vibe and sounds like Don Henley on opium. It includes the lyrics that give the album its names sake, “Let’s toast the last romance, but just don’t ask me to dance”. Confessions of a Big Brother has some of the best lyrics on this album. It is bitter brotherly advice and a person diary, so take notes. I particularly like the line, “You’ll soon get sick of micro-waving low fat meals for one.” Ahhhh, the perks of being in a relationship, especially one that involve girlfriends who can and do cook. Reminding me that I should really be getting dinner ready!
Someone please hug that Mr. Moffatt. By Come Round & Love Me the aching is nearly too much for me. Violins and all, it is cheerless music for lost and unrequited loves and the broken hearted. However, somehow there is a glimmer of hope. I think because it is so real, the music breathes, it has a heartbeat and not just a drumbeat. It’s sad, but its realism is unavoidable and you can’t help but relate to each and every tale. Aidan Moffatt reminds us of the melancholic trials of life and love. Through that particular fog of gloom there is the hope that things do actually get better, that things are actually better. And with that, track 7, Speed Date comes like that first gulp of air after coming up from long dive underwater. The guitar line gallops and it’s catchier and feels lighter in spirit.
The first single from The Last Romance is track 8, Dream Sequence. This song is probably the strongest on the album due to the extremely catchy Coldplay-esque piano melody. Through the lyrical sarcasm, there’s hope for a future together, even if it’s just a dream. Fine Tuning strip off layers of instrumentation and is about the inevitable of pain and breaking ups. When things are good, bad stuff is always just waiting around the corner for us. The grand finale with its horns and marching band drumbeat is There is No Ending, putting the album out of it misery on a higher note.
There are only so much of musicians cutting out their hearts and lyrically serving it to you on a platter that I can handle. There was a moment during this listening secession that I thought I couldn’t take it anymore and I don’t think that I could listen to The Last Romance straight through in one sitting again. However, it is laced with exquisite truths about lust & love and what comes or might come there after. If you have been in any of these situations, you’ll really get it and appreciate this sensitive romanticized male perspective on romance. Which also happens to be sung by one of the sexiest voices you’ll ever hear?
Words: Zoe E. Gottehrer
My Rating: 7 out of 10
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